VOICE OF THE PEOPLE (letter).

Having it both ways

August 17, 2001|By Steve Nesich.

Seattle, Wash. — Although he's obviously trying to do so, George W. Bush can't have it both ways. By choosing to "allow federal funds to be used for research on existing stem cell lines" while prohibiting their use on the creation of new ones, he has clearly demonstrated the primacy of politics in this contradictory decision.

Has Bush ever known anyone with diabetes, Alzheimer's disease or a spinal cord injury? Does he have any idea of the grief and suffering this creates for those afflicted individuals and their families? To effectively say that government should support this research--but that it should also be strictly limited--is to tie the hands of the doctors and scientists who might one day be able to find a cure for such terrible illnesses. Bush has clearly decided that it is more important to placate his Christian fundamentalist supporters on this issue than to stand above politics.